


Can't Set Rules About Love

by beatles_bum



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: ADHD Trip Tucker, Autistic Malcolm Reed, Established Relationship, Fluff and Humor, Fluff without Plot, M/M, Morning Cuddles, Romantic Fluff, Secret Relationship, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-14 11:55:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28545195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beatles_bum/pseuds/beatles_bum
Summary: Almost everyone on the ship knew model officer Lieutenant Reed, but Trip was just about the only person who got to see the real Malcolm- the person that lay beneath the hardass mask. Hell, he was probably just about the only person who could convince the man to get some shuteye when he'd been overworking himself, aside from Archer literally ordering him. It made him feel special to know that Malcolm felt comfortable letting his guard down a little around him, even if he wasn't ready to go public with their relationship just yet.“No frat” regulations, as the crew so fondly referred to them, made navigating a relationship on Enterprise quite difficult. But luckily for Trip and Malcolm, they’re both pretty good at keeping secrets, and neither of them are the type of person to back away from a challenge. But there are bound to be a few slip-ups here and there, and their latest mistake might just be enough to reveal their secret.
Relationships: Malcolm Reed & Charles "Trip" Tucker III, Malcolm Reed/Charles "Trip" Tucker III
Comments: 18
Kudos: 47





	Can't Set Rules About Love

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!!! This is my first time publishing a fic on here (we're gonna pretend like my Wattpad days didn't happen because that was all Awful) so I'm a little nervous tbh, but I'm proud of this fluffy fic of ADHD Trip making sure his autistic boyfriend's hyperfocus and executive dysfunction won't keep him from getting food and rest (it doesn't explicitly say in the fic that they're neurodivergent but that's how I intended it to be interpreted). I'm super excited to be a part of this unerappreciated fandom, so... here goes, I guess.

"And here, we have a wild armory officer in his natural habitat," Trip Tucker chuckled in his best impersonation of a nature documentary as he entered the armory, setting the tray of food he'd been carrying down on the armory officer's desk before turning his attention back to the Englishman as he was hard at work.

Malcolm Reed hummed in response, not breaking his attention away from the task at hand. Despite his apparent concentration on his work, however, the corner of his lip quirked up into the smallest possible grin- barely noticeable to any other member of the crew, but it'd be hard for someone who knew the man as well as Trip to not catch it. The engineer cleared his throat, resting a hand on his hip as he approached the area that Malcolm had been working in.

"I coulda sworn yer shift was s'posed to end a few hours ago," he commented, not really expecting a response.

"It was," Malcolm muttered to himself, sparing a brief glance towards Trip before resuming his work. "But I've still got loads of work to do."

Trip scoffed to himself- from where he was, it looked like Malcolm was making upgrades to the ship's targeting sensors. Not only could this not have been an order from Archer, since this was the third time this week that the armory officer upgraded the sensors, but it definitely could've waited until his next shift, if he was really so concerned about upgrading them again. "How long has it been since you had anything to eat, Mal?" He questioned, crossing his arms over his chest.

Malcolm paused in his work, glancing up at the ceiling of the armory to think. "A while," he let out a slight huff of a chuckle, shaking his head to himself. "Definitely longer than you'd be happy with."

"You gotta eat, hon," Trip sighed softly, shaking his head. "Why don'tcha take a break from those upgrades and have some dinner with yer boyfriend, hm? I'll force feed you if I have to."

"I'll be fine, Trip," Malcolm muttered, returning to work. "I was planning on eating after-"

He paused, just then realizing what the engineer had said and snapping his head up to meet his gaze. He tried his best to fix a playful glare on the other man, but with the warmth he could feel rising to his cheeks, he doubted it was very convincing.

"I thought we agreed that we'd keep this a secret?" he murmured in a low tone.

"In case you haven't noticed, we're the only ones in here," Trip responded casually, a smug look on his face. "It's just you and me. Which means I get to call you all the pet names I want."

"Still, you can never be too careful," Malcolm countered, though the expression on his face indicated that he wasn't completely serious.

"Malcolm, Malcolm, Malcolm," Trip sighed, stepping closer to his lover as he shook his head. "Always so cautious."

That earned a slight huff of a chuckle from Malcolm as he rolled his eyes, setting the tool he was using down beside him as he looked up to meet his boyfriend's gaze. "I _am_ an armory officer, after all," the corner of his mouth quirked up into a slight smirk. "It sort of comes with the job."

Trip let out a hearty chuckle, a warm grin spreading across his face as he shook his head. "Well, yer technically not on the job anymore, so you can let yer guard down a little. Think you can spare a minute to eat with yer boyfriend?"

Malcolm shook his head. "I've got to finish these upgr-"

"No you don't," Trip interrupted. "Not yet, at least. Right now, you need to eat. Knowing you, I doubt you've had anything all day."

Malcolm gulped, his gaze suddenly falling anywhere but Trip- the engineer knew him far too well.

"C'mon, darlin'," Trip pleaded, reaching out a hand to help Malcolm up. "You gotta eat somethin'. Can't keep lettin' yerself get so invested in yer work that you forget to take care of yerself."

"Like you're one to talk," Malcolm chuckled to himself as he took Trip's hand, allowing himself to be helped to his feet.

"You got me there, " Trip chuckled. "But I'm not nearly as bad as you, and you know it."

"I'll admit to that," Malcolm chuckled, and after glancing around to make certain that no one was there, he tugged the engineer down by his uniform for a brief kiss, pulling away with a slight smirk on his face.

"Oh, getting brave, are we?" Trip wiggled his eyebrows at the other man.

"Don't push your luck," Malcolm warned in a jokingly serious tone.

"Can't make any promises," Trip chuckled smugly. "Now, let's eat. Before the food gets cold."

"And then it's back to work for me," Malcolm added with a sigh.

"I could help you with that after we eat," Trip volunteered. "It'd go a hell of a lot faster with two people working. And then afterwards, we can go to my quarters and just snuggle up together until we fall asleep. That sound good?"

Malcolm felt a slight heat rise to his cheeks at his boyfriend's suggestion, nodding before standing on his toes to peck the taller man's nose. "That sounds lovely," he murmured sweetly, the corners of his lips tugged upwards in a small grin.

* * *

Trip awoke the next morning with a familiar weight pressed against his front, glancing down and grinning to himself at the sight of Malcolm with his arms wrapped tightly around him, his head resting on his shoulder. With his boyfriend's face tucked into the crook of his neck, he could feel every breath that slipped past the other man's slightly parted lips brush feather-light against his skin, and he couldn't help but chuckle quietly to himself at how much it tickled him. He’d never been a morning person, but he couldn't help but feel like waking up early would be worth it if it meant he could see just how peaceful Malcolm looked when he finally let himself rest.

God, he wished he could just pause time and stay in these moments forever.

As if he sensed that his company was awake, Malcolm shifted slightly in bed, stretching a little before his eyes fluttered open. He hummed quietly, a small grin spreading across his face as his gaze fell on Trip, and god, the engineer could've sworn he felt his heart skip a beat at just how adorable his boyfriend was when he was sleepy. Every morning he saw him like this, it always felt like he was falling in love with the man all over again, and for a moment, it feels like they’re waking up together for the first time again.

"Mornin', sleepin' beauty," Trip chuckled, greeting his boyfriend with his signature smirk as the other man met his gaze with those stormy eyes of his.

"Morning, Trip," Malcolm murmured softly, shaking his head at the nickname. "Sleep well?" he added after a brief pause.

"Mhm," Trip hummed, leaning down to press a gentle kiss to his boyfriend's forehead. "How 'bout you?"

"I slept wonderfully," Malcolm replied, closing his eyes at the kiss to his forehead before reopening them and looking back up at the other man. "You make a nice pillow,” he added as a sleepy grin spread across his face.

“Do I?” Trip chuckled softly, carding a hand through Malcolm’s dark hair.

"Absolutely," Malcolm replied, letting a content sigh slip past his lips. "And, as an added bonus, you double as a nice stuffed animal, too," he added as he snuggled closer to Trip.

"Well, I'm glad you think I'm comfortable," Trip grinned, snaking an arm around Malcom and letting his hand rest gently on the small of his back.

The two laid in silence for a few moments before Malcolm spoke up, an amused tone to his voice. “As much as I’d love to lay here for a while,” he began with a soft chuckle, attempting to wriggle his way out of his boyfriend’s embrace. “I should really take a shower before I make my escape.”

“Do you _have_ to?” Trip jokingly whined like a kid, wrapping his arms tighter around Malcolm to prevent him from leaving.

“You’re more than welcome to join me, if you'd like,” Malcolm replied, his tone so cheeky that Trip would sooner believe it was himself talking than the man he held in his arms.

“As tempting as that sounds,” Trip began, chuckling lightly. “I think I wanna lay here and snuggle for a few more minutes.”

“You know, you’re making it harder and harder for me to sneak out of here without anyone noticing every day,” Malcolm muttered in a jokingly exasperated tone, contradicting his own words by snuggling closer to the other man. “I’m starting to think you _want_ people to find out that you’re breaking the rules against fraternizing with your subordinates.”

“Let ‘em talk, then,” Trip replied in a dismissive tone. “What’re they gonna do, report two senior officers to the cap’n?”

“You never know,” Malcolm stated simply.

“You and I both know that Jon doesn’t care about that rule. Not unless people are too busy gawking at their sweethearts to do their job, that is."

It wasn’t until he noticed the gaze that Malcolm had fixed him with that Trip had realized that the other man may not have been entirely joking.

“But disregardin’ that,” he continued, leaning down to press a kiss to Malcolm’s forehead. “I know you’ve got yer own reasons for not wantin’ to go public just yet. We’ll take things at the pace you want, alright, darlin’?”

Malcolm flashed the other man a grateful smile before leaning up to press a soft kiss to his lips, the grin still on his face when he pulled away.

“I suppose I could lay here another few minutes,” he stated simply, snaking his arms around his boyfriend’s neck and resting his head on Trip’s shoulder as he snuggled closer to him.

They'd been stealing moments like this for a few months now- laying together at night until they fell asleep, talking for a while in the morning, and then sneaking out before anyone could see them. Trip enjoyed this arrangement, and as the two fell into a comfortable silence, he couldn't help but feel like Malcolm did, too, although he had a harder time expressing that. Trip couldn't fault him for not being quite as in touch with his emotions as he was- they had been raised by completely different types of people, and thus, they were practically polar opposites when it came to feelings and such. One wouldn’t expect two people with such differing views on love to go together as well as they did, but once Trip had managed to work his way through the walls that Malcolm had constructed around himself oh so carefully, the two found that they had much more in common than they’d originally thought, and that they balanced each other out when it came to their differences. Things were working out astonishingly well so far.

Trip had no clue how long they’d been laying there before Malcolm’s voice tore him from his thoughts yet again.

“Trip?” the armory officer murmured, to which the engineer hummed in reply to signify that he was listening. “What time is it?”

With a soft sigh, Trip glanced over at the chronometer, squinting slightly so he could read. “Uh... 0600,” he stated simply.

“ _What?!_ ”

Malcolm’s eyes flew open as he shot up in bed, checking the time for himself as if to make sure it wasn’t a joke and gasping quietly to himself when he realized that it wasn’t. Trip fixed him with a confused look, not sure why he seemed so panicked by the time.

“Christ, Trip, we’re supposed to be on duty in half an hour!”

Trip’s eyes widened slightly as he sat up as well, only then processing their situation. “Son of a bitch,” he muttered to himself before exchanging worried glances with his boyfriend. “We’d better get our asses in gear, then.”

Without another word shared between them, the two men got out of bed, discarding their pajamas on the floor and picking up their uniforms from the same place. Once they were both in uniform, the couple left Trip’s quarters together, relieved that there was no one in the corridor despite how close it was to time for a shift change as they entered the turbolift.

On the ride up to the bridge, Trip shifted uncomfortably- for some odd reason, his uniform seemed a little tighter than usual. It wasn’t so bad that he’d be miserable, but it was enough that he had to keep tugging on his sleeves as they slid up on their own, which could be a distraction while he was on duty. He’d just have to deal with it for now, though. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that Malcolm seemed to be having the opposite struggle- he rolled his sleeves up numerous times, but they kept sliding down. He chuckled to himself at the sight, turning fully towards him to make a comment about it.

He froze when he saw the rank insignia on the other man’s uniform- three pips. That wasn’t right. Fearing the worst, he glanced down at his own, and sure enough, there were only two.

“God damn it,” he muttered to himself, an exasperated sigh slipping past his lips.

“Something wrong?” Malcolm asked in a concerned tone, clearly oblivious to the situation.

“We accidentally swapped our uniforms,” Trip stated simply, earning a frustrated groan from the other man as he glanced at their uniforms to confirm.

“What’re we gonna do?” the smaller man asked.

“Nothin’ much we _can_ do ‘cept hope no one notices,” Trip sighed yet again. “ ‘S not like we got time to fix it.”

Malcolm let out a quiet sigh just as the turbolift doors hissed and opened, signifying their arrival to the bridge. They stepped out of the turbolift, trying to look as nonchalant as possible as they made their way to their posts.

"Trip!" Archer exclaimed once the engineer had settled himself at the engineering station, a friendly grin on his face. "T'pol and I missed you at breakfast this morning."

Trip paused to think for a moment, groaning when he remembered that he'd had plans to join T'pol and the captain for breakfast before their shift.

"Ah, sorry cap'n. I, uh, woke up a little late," he met Archer's gaze with a sheepish grin. "Think I can make it up to you tomorrow?"

"I dunno, Trip, my feelings are pretty hurt," Archer replied in an uncertain tone, though his expression indicated that it was only a joke. As he took a few steps closer to where Trip and Malcolm stood at their posts, both men silently hoped he wouldn't look at their ranking pips, or notice how awkwardly both of their uniforms fit. Judging by the noticeable change in the captain's facial expression, however, Trip would bet anything that he had noticed- and if he knew anything about his captain and friend, it was that he'd never let him live something like this down.

"By the way, Trip," he began, a teasing smile on his face. "How'd you manage to get yourself demoted to Lieutenant in less than a day?"

“Whaddaya mean, cap’n?” Trip questioned, trying his best to play dumb.

“You think I can’t see that yours and Malcolm’s pips are wrong?” Archer chuckled. “How blind do you think I am?”

Trip opened his mouth to reply, but, much to his relief, Malcolm interjected.

"Captain, we can explain-" he began before being cut off.

"You don't have to explain anything," Archer laughed, shaking his head slightly. "From the way you two always looked at each other, I knew if it wasn’t already happening, then it would start soon."

"Was it that obvious?" Trip laughed lightly, a slight pink hue coming to his cheeks.

"We were all betting on how long it'd take you to get together," Hoshi commented from her station as Travis laughed, nodding in confirmation.

“Well, if it settles your bet, next week marks three months since we made it official,” Trip commented simply, the corner of his lips quirking up slightly into a smirk.

“I _knew_ it’d take less than six months,” Travis exclaimed triumphantly as Hoshi rolled her eyes.

Trip just chuckled to himself, shaking his head slightly before glancing over at Malcolm with an amused expression. His smile faltered slightly when he saw how alarmed his boyfriend seemed- even though it was clear there would be no formal punishment for their relationship, that didn’t change the fact that Malcolm had more personal reasons for keeping things a secret. He couldn’t imagine how anxious he’d be feeling knowing that their little secret was revealed.

“Alright, Ensigns,” he cut into the other officers’ laughter, a serious tone to his voice. “The cat may be outta the bag on the bridge, but Malcolm wasn’t quite ready to go public yet, so try not to tell the whole ship about us, okay?”

“Understood, sir,” Travis replied, and Hoshi nodded in agreement.

"And… you're completely fine with this, Captain?" Malcolm asked in an uncertain tone, fixing a questioning gaze on Archer.

"Trust me, if I went after everyone that broke the fraternization rules here, I wouldn't have the time to do anything else. It's not like I can say 'hey, listen, do you think you can wait a minute before you attack us? I gotta tell Starfleet Command that I just saw two crewmen holding hands in the mess hall.' I got bigger things to worry about than what my crew chooses to do with their free time," Archer chuckled, shaking his head and crossing his arms over his chest. "Just don't let it get in the way of your duties, alright?"

"Of course, cap'n," Trip nodded, sending Malcolm a smirk that silently said ' _see? I told you so._ '

"By the way, you two might want to fix your uniform situation," Archer added with a smirk. "I can't imagine either of you are all that comfortable wearing the wrong size."

Both Trip's and Malcolm's faces went redder than they'd ever been as they exchanged sheepish glances with each other, nodding as they stood from their chairs.

"Right away, sir," Malcolm replied as the two made their way to the turbolift.

So much for their little secret.

**Author's Note:**

> I swear you can see exactly when the ideas stopped coming to me as clearly as they had at the beginning, forgive how rushed the end of this sounds, lmao.
> 
> Also, I stole the title from the song Can't Set Rules About Love by Adam Ant, and upon revising, I realized that I sort of subconsciously used it as an inspiration for this oneshot, which totally makes sense bc not only is it one of my favorite songs by him, it's one of my favorite songs in general.
> 
> Anywho, if you made it this far, thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I loved writing it :)


End file.
